Not Exactly Atlantis
by Seiberwing
Summary: With great power comes great dampness. At least it does at Thrust's new command post.


I don't own anyone but my fancharacters, yadda yadda.

**Not Exactly Atlantis**

Aztac Base Four was, surprisingly enough, the third Decepticon base on Planet Aztac. It had once been the fourth, but the idiots at Aztac Base Two had been stupid enough to let themselves be invaded by Autobots and no one had wanted to bother changing the name.

Thrust could really care less if it was called Aztac Interplanetary Bar and Love Shack, because it also happened to be his very first true command post.

_Not bad,_he thought asthe entrance hatch closed behind him. _A bit shabby, but not bad for a rising commander on his first step to greatness._

"Commander Thrust!"

"Eek!" Thrust jumped a few feet in a most uncommanderly fashion.

A shorter purple mech stood at attention behind him, one arm raised in a stiff salute. Thrust quickly turned and snapped back another salute in a desperate attempt to get some modicum of dignity back.

"I'm Wavelength. I've been appointed to be your second in command, sir." He dropped his arm to his side, still standing at attention.

"Ah, of course." Thrust still couldn't restrain those little surges that went through his systems every time the word "commander" was attached to his name.

There was a loud whoosh and gurgling as someone entered the airlock that connected the underwater base to the ocean. Thrust waited for a moment, expecting to see another one of his subordinates.

What emerged instead was a monster.

It was a mottled bluish-grey creature, with two webbed and clawed feet in front and a thick armored tail that draggedalong the floor as the creature crawled forward. Its long neck swerved back and forth, surveying the room with gruesome yellow eyes mounted on a grotesque head with scraggly splintered teeth. Thrust managed to raise his shaking arm to aim at the disgusting beast, right before it rearranged its body and transformed into an equally ugly Decepticon.

"Fresssh meat?" he hissed, grinning to reveal pointed mandenta that mimicked those of his vehicle mode's head.

"Fresh commander, fishbreath," snapped Wavelength, showing the first sign of strong emotion Thrust had seen from him. "Show a little respect."

The monster Decepticon approached Thrust, still looking at him with that sinister, hungry grin. His alt-mode head, which was now on the end of his right arm, flicked a thick purple glossa over its jagged teeth. "Sssame differenccce." He flashed his fangs again before moving off to a computer terminal on the far side of the room, water still dripping from his legs as he walked.

"That would be DeathFanyg, our resident miswire," Wavelength muttered. "You'll get used to him after a while, he's mostly bluff."

Thrust's optics flickered as he attempted to process this. "Deathfang?" It was an odd and rather pretentious name, but he'd heard worse.

Wavelength shook his head. "DeathFanyg. There's an emphasis on the "f" and a lilt at the end." He smiled nervously at his superior, who stared after the monster Decepticon with a mixture of befuddlement and confusion.

"...why?" Thrust managed to stammer out.

Wavelength shrugged. "He seems to think it makes him sound unique and impressive. His name was Eviscerate before he came here and got himself an alt-mode that looks like a Chomper."

Thrust kept watching in fascinated horror as DeathFanyg kept entering data one-handed. His alt-mode head yawned, exposing even more yellowed teeth. "What's a Chomper?" he asked without looking back at Wavelength.

"It's a native aquatic reptile that tries to eat almost anything it catches, and tries to catch even the things it doesn't want to eat. You'll probably see a few around; they like chasing the smaller boat-cons."

"Oh," said Thrust, attempting not to sound even more disturbed than he already was.

"It's a good alt-mode for underwater reconnaissance, because he can blend in with the locals. We think it may be going to his head, though. He keeps trying to eat fish and I've seen him rip an Autobot's throat out with his teeth."

Thrust repressed a shudder as DeathFanyg finally finished up and sloshed out of the room, leaving a small seawater puddle under the console. "Really."

"Really." Wavelength grinned mischeviously. "And not the ones from his vehicle-mode. Shall I show you to your quarters, sir?"

After Wavelength left, Thrust spent a few moments pacing about and enjoying the size of his room. His new quarters were the most luxurious set he had ever been in, with their own private shower rack and even a small storage closet to put spare possessions in instead of throwing them in a pile under the large berth.

"It's good to be leader," Thrust mused, trying out an evil commander chuckle just to see how it felt. It fit quite well. He leaned against the wall and spread his arms to the scene. "Perfect. Perfect. Per-"

Plink.

Thrust felt a wet droplet land on his head. He looked up and caught a second drip on his right optic. "-fect. The ceiling leaks." Another droplet hit his nose defiantly and he glared at the dripping, attempting to either intimidate it into stopping or spontaneously develop heat vision and weld the thing shut himself. The pipe on the ceiling, which was leaking just at its conjunction with the pipe going down the wall, remained insubordinate.

Plink.

Plink.

Plinkplinkplink.

"Gah!" Thrust slammed his fist onto the door panel and stomped into the hall. "Give me defective quarters, will they? I'll show them what's what." He was so wrapped up in his own sulking that he didn't notice the rippling of light on water until he was five steps beyond it.

Thrust paused, looking behind him curiously. "What on Cybertron…"

It was, for lack of a better term, a fountain in the middle of the hallway.

The entire arrangement was only about ten feet around and fifteen feet high. Murky seawater was jetting up out of an exposed pipe on the floor in an elegant arc, landing in a small ten-foot wide basin that was painted a deep purple. From there, the water swirled through several tubes, and went into a pipe at the other end of the basin with a rather delicious rushing sound. It was actually rather pleasing to observe, as crude as it was.

Thrust kept watching, explaining to himself that the drip was not liable to make his berth start floating in the short amount of time that he paused by the fountain. It made him feel slightly more relaxed and increased the likelihood that there would be no severe casualties in the ranks as a result of his faulty quarters.

"Is something wrong, sir?"

Thrust restrained the "eek" this time. It was another one of his subordinates, this one a short mech in muted blues and greens with the hull of his altmode spread out behind him like a set of badly-made wings. Thrust was fairly certain the other Decepticon had introduced himself at some point, but his identity had slithered into the depths of Thrust's memory banks and hidden under the long-forgotten combination to his room at the War Academy.

"What is that thing?" Thrust asked, pointing at the fountain.

"It's one of Icedart's projects," replied the smaller mech, who Thrust had just remembered had a name that started with an R. Or maybe a J. There had been an awful lot of names on the roster and he hadn't had much time to look at it.

"Oh?" Thrust asked, folding his hands and looking properly authoritative.

"Yes, sir. A lot of the pipes around here spring leaks from time to time and we don't have the funding to get new ones, so we have to keep repairing them. We sent Icedart down to the storage room to fix it, and when he didn't come back up after a few hours, we went down and found he'd made the hole bigger and added a few more pipes to it. We liked the first one so much that now he's got them up all over the base." The unnamed Decepticon grinned rather sheepishly and pointed at the fountain. "He titled this one 'Continental Current.' I don't really know why."

Thrust kept staring at the fountain, his mind ticking off various points. Not that he wanted anyone messing about in his new quarters, but they were sorely lacking in any sort of decorative appeal. "Where's Icedart now?"

"I think he's in the commons room, sir." The smaller mech tilted his head to the side slightly. "Why?"

"Have him come up to my quarters. There's a problem I'd like him to look at."


End file.
